You might not come across many caricaturists in your lifetime. On vacation or in tourist spots, you can likely sit down with an artist and have them draw you in 10 minutes, but these experiences are not regular occurrences and are usually pretty expensive.

When we’ve all got thousands of photos of ourselves and our loved ones at our fingertips, why would we need to sit still in front of gathering onlookers in order to get our faces drawn? Photolamus is a caricature service that aims to bring artists and customers together in this increasingly digital world.

Using Photolamus is simple. Through the company’s Android app (as well as Web, iOS and Mac interfaces), simply submit your photo, select the desired style and receive your caricature in digital form in 1-5 days.

Prices vary based on the number of people present in the provided photo, the style chosen and the required turnaround time. Styles range from black and white pencil, to full-color digital drawings, with a broad number of themes from Vacation to Sports to Halloween to Professions or a straight-up regular caricature. All Photolamaus’s caricatures are 100% hand-drawn by artists across the globe — it isn’t simply an app that just applies gawky effects to your images. There are no computer-generated images involved — these are real caricatures from real artists.

And the results are truly excellent. You can check out some of Photolamus’s artists’ recent works at the company’s website or within the app, but if you don’t believe those, check out the Halloween themed caricatures provided of my photo below. These were returned to me within 24 hours of submitting my photo to Photolamus which is a truly impressive turnaround.

The quick turnaround makes them ideal as gifts and their digital delivery means you are not waiting (or paying) for a physical package to arrive at your door. Photolamus does not offer printed versions — if you submit your image in the Android app, you’ll receive the finished version there too — and instead provides high-res caricatures in digital form. The 4,000px by 4,0000px resultant image is owned by you and can be used in whatever form you want — from your Twitter avatar or Facebook profile pic to being self-printed on canvas (up to 100cm by 100cm without loss in quality).

The Android app itself is fairly plain in terms of design, but it makes it easy to upload your photo (by taking new, adding from the Gallery, or from Facebook, Twitter, Google+, Instagram, Flickr or VK) and place an order with your desired theme. There’s no way to preview the result and no free trial — the artist has to draw it, after all — which may disappoint some users. However, the artists — like you, no doubt — can’t work for free.

The app is translated into a slew of languages meaning it can be used all around the world and there are regular opportunities to win discounts and prizes through the app.

To coincide with the review here at Android and Me, Photolamus has dropped the prices of its caricatures to provide our readers with some sweet deals:

The prices are affordable and, having seen the results, are worth every penny in my opinion. Being hand-drawn, the results are unique to each order and, if you’re willing to pay a little extra, you can have the caricature back within one day which makes for a great last minute gift.

Adam is Reviews Editor for PhoneDog, Android and Me and Today's iPhone. A Media and Communications graduate from Newcastle University in the UK, Adam is a Bradford City FC fanatic and self-confessed tech-nerd. You can follow him on Twitter: @adamoram.